


Walking In The Dark

by strixus



Category: Gundam Wing
Genre: Mystery, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-31
Updated: 2009-12-31
Packaged: 2017-10-05 12:56:02
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,740
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/41957
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/strixus/pseuds/strixus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Someone has been killing survivors of the war. On a rainy night Heero must confront the killer.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Walking In The Dark

**Author's Note:**

> One of my first attempts at a style I've grown to enjoy.

Dusk was settling heavily on the city, the darkness hurried in by the hovering dark clouds that signaled rain was coming, and soon. Heero Yui stood looking out of the large swinging pane windows of his fourteenth story flat onto the lower buildings around his building, and the bustle of people below, hurrying to get home before the deluge that the clouds threatened burst forth. Glancing at the clock over the small TV, he sighed and shook his head. It was almost time to leave, time to take care of this act he had been dreading. But it had to be done; it was how it had to be.   
So far, the local authorities had found ten victims, each dead for a number of days before they had been found in their own home, and Heero knew they would find the others soon.. Tonight one more would join the list waiting to be found, and it, he hoped, would be the last. It had to be the last. It was too dangerous to let this continue, especially as similarities were beginning to be noticed between this, and a series of killings two years ago, in another city, tens of thousands of miles away. Each had been killed in a different way, and then been mutilated almost beyond recognition after death. There seemed to be no common link between the victims, except in this gruesome act after their death. The world was too small a place to hide such things for very long, a fact Heero knew too well.   
He turned away from the window just as the first drops of rain splashed against it, and picked up the battered and faded brown leather flight jacket off the couch and shrugged it on. Its weight felt comfortable on his shoulders, wrapping around him almost like a second skin. He barely was aware of the weight of the 9mm semi-automatic that rested in a holster pocket inside the right inside breast pocket of the coat, so familiar a thing it was. It was part of him, that gun, part of his life: he could not imagine life without it, for he had never known it. And now, on this most unpleasant of evenings, it went with him as it always did.  
He walked to the door, not bothering to get his keys off the small table they rested on beside the doorway, and opened it slowly. He stopped then, and looked back at the window, watching the rain. Without thinking, his hand pulled open the small hidden drawer of the table, and reached for the folding knife inside. The cold metal of the grip felt good on his hands, the familiar curve fit almost too well to his fingers. He tucked the knife into the side pocket of the jacket, and zipped it shut, then stepped through the door, pulling it closed, but not locked, behind him.

* * *  
The rain was falling in thick heavy drops, soaking his skin and plastering his hair to his head, cold drops running down the back of his neck and down along his back. They set a chill in his bones, but he did not let it bother him. He was beyond such things. Time was running out, he knew, and he still had so many things to set right.   
The world was wrong, the future filled with people who should never live. So many should have died in the wars, so many should have been killed who were not, and he had to set it right. Remove them, remove their children, remove them from having existed since the wars. Things must be set right, set as they should have been. Had it not been for him, things would be right. But they were horribly, horribly wrong.  
His thoughts raced as he knelt in the shadows and the rain in the alleyway between two row houses, his joints growing stiff with the cold, rain running into his eyes and under his clothes. He had to wait for her: she was the next one, and she had to be killed. She should be dead, and she wasn't. And it just wasn't right, not right at all, for a dead woman to be walking the streets, working a job, and living like a living person. Dead people should be dead.  
How long he crouched there, he wasn't sure, but it was almost dark when she passed the alleyway. He knew she would, she had every day for the last week, on her way home form wherever she was in the day. She hurried by, almost too fast for him to see her, but he did. He knew her, down to the sound of her shoes on the wet sidewalk. He would wait here, and then follow her to her home. He knew which house, he knew how to open her lock, he even knew where she kept her spare key. Tonight, one more dead person would be as they should be: Dead.

* * *

The rubber sole of Heero's boot made only a slight splash as he stepped through the puddle that had formed at the base of the stairs up to the door of the townhouse. He paused there, and looked up, contemplating the brick façade darkened with rain, the curtained windows as dark and blank as dead eyes, and the small creep of wild ivy on the side of the house. It was a nice house, small for this part of town, but still upscale enough it spoke well of the woman who lived there.   
If he closed his eyes, he could see her, as she was in the file photo, dark haired and green eyed, smiling slightly. He knew her almost as well as he knew himself, her likes and dislikes, her habits and hobbies, everything. It was too bad, he thought as he took the first step up the cement stairs, that it was all for nothing. She was dead.   
The rain continued to pour down, cold water droplets striking the back of his neck unnoticed, to slide down his spine. It was now almost completely dark, the streetlights starting to flicker to life, illuminating the thick mist of the rain in orange halos of light. Heero hesitated again, this time on the last step. How he hated this, and loathed that he had to do this. But he had to, else everything would be put to risk more than it could stand, and could possibly crumble around his ears – around all of their ears. Unconsciously he flexed his hands in his pockets, feeling the tightness of the leather gloves around his fingers.   
Enough of this, he thought to himself, any more delay and it all could be ruined even if this does work. He sighed, and pulled a small white cloth out of one of his many jacket pockets and gingerly wiped the brass doorknob clean, then turned it, letting the weight of the door swing it inwards and open. Without a moments hesitation, he stepped in, and pulled the door closed behind him.

* * *

He hesitated on the threshold, looking around the darkened front room with night adapted eyes. There was no motion, no sound of activity here. Above his head, he heard the faint squeak of floor joists.   
Upstairs, she was upstairs.  
With footsteps as quiet as a cat, he moved towards the stairs to the second floor of the house. He caught the slight smell of woman, the clean, perfumed smell, drifting down from the second floor. He listened again, and heard a door shut. Counting ten, he started up the stairs. His body instinctively drew into a crouch, his hand going for the weapon hidden inside his jacket., gripping it tightly. Surprise was the key to this.  
He topped the stairs, and saw the bedroom door, the faint edge of light spilling out from under it. Oh, yes, dead woman, it is time for you to die, time to be as you should be. He licked his lips unconsciously, more nerves than it would have appeared to the external observer.   
He moved towards the door, hand reaching out for the door knob like a child reaching for the gold ring on a merry go round ride. This was his prize, his goal. Excitement rose as a nervous tingle from within his gut, making his hand almost shake. When his tongue darted over his bottom lip again, it was in anticipation.   
The cold of the door knob bit into his hand, taking the breath from him. Oh, yes. With a turn and a shove, the door swung open….

* * *

Heero instinctively ducked the minute he pushed the door open. The knife blade passed inches above his head, a flash of red and silver. Blue eyes that seemed to glow like gas flames regarded him from out of a pale, blood streaked face. Heero felt the urge to be sick, seeing the blood splattered walls, floor, and, crumpled in the corner, what was left of the woman's body. That was unfortunate, he thought, but inevitable.  
With a scream of rage which revealed blood streaked teeth, his attacker came at him again, bringing the knife overhand in a clumsy stab downwards. Barely seeming to move, Heero caught the slim, pale wrist above his head. He gave a slow, bone crunching squeeze, and the knife fell from the suddenly limp hand with a clatter onto the carpeted floor.   
Quatre gave a small whimper of animal pain, and weakly tried to struggle away from the grip that still held his broken wrist. The flame in his eyes died, leaving only a shadow of empty coldness. Looking at his friend, streaked in blood and soaked with rain, Heero felt disgust and pity turn his stomach. It was too much like looking into a mirror of his past. He let go of Quatre's wrist, and the small blond crumpled to his knees, cradling the crushed joint to his chest.   
"H – Heero…" Quatre started, his voice a rasp. "What… What did I just do?" Empty, tear rimmed eyes scanned the room, taking in the gore. A sob wracked the small frame, and all Heero could do was watch. "Oh… Oh, God…I killed her…" Panic shook Quatre's already trembling voice.   
"Quatre, listen. It wasn't you. It was, but it wasn't." Quatre looked up at him, confused. Heero closed his eyes, and sighed. He said the single world that explained it all.  
"Zero."

* * *


End file.
